Instructions

squeeze cabbage and salt vigorously with hands until liquid runs freely (this may take a few minutes)

put cabbage and liquid in mason jars, leaving an inch or two of "headroom", and close lids

leave to sit, not in sunlight, but somewhere you won't forget about it (kitchen counter?)

"burp" the jars every day for the first few days (if you don't do this, they may spill over and/or break the top!)

it's ready after 4 days or 4 months or somewhere in between, depending on how you like it

Eat it

on its own

on a sandwich

as a side dish with grilled meat

juice it!

Mixed/Fancy Kraut

Follow recipe for Basic Sauerkraut, but use a mixture of vegetables instead of just cabbage, slice or cut into shapes and sizes as you like, and/or add herbs and/or spices to taste. Caraway seeds are a classic seasoning; 1 tsp per pound of cabbage is a ballpark amount, although different caraway seeds have different potencies. Things like garlic, ginger, turmeric, horseradish, burdock, etc. can provide nice flavor and health benefits.

Beet Kvass

Ingredients and Equipment

a handful of beets (red or golden, number needed may vary with size)

1 Tbsp salt

large, sharp chef's knife

large cutting board

half-gallon mason jar

(optional) vegetable peeler

Instructions

fill jar halfway with water

add salt

put lid on jar and shake until salt is dissolved

if the beets are not organic, peel them

cut beets into 1/2-inch cubes

put beets in mason jar, to fill about 1/4 or 1/3 of jar

fill jar nearly to top with water, leaving an inch or two, and close lid

beet greens, if there were any, can be fermented as "Mixed/Fancy Kraut" recipe above

wait a 4 days to 4 weeks, tasting the liquid periodically

once you like it, strain out the beets and store them separately

the liquid is "beet kvass"

the fermented beets may be slice and used in a salad, or juiced, or whatever

Thursday, April 2, 2015

We've all heard the story of the Israelites hastily leaving Egypt and not having time for their bread to rise. We know this as the explanation for why we’re forced to eat matzah, or unleavened bread. But are there any other explanations for why we scorn chametz, or leavened bread, during the 8 days of passover?

Let's first look at the word chametz, which is cognate to the Aramaic word meaning "to ferment or leaven" and the Arabic ḥamuḍa, "to be sour", "to become acidic". Long fermented bread is more sour & aptly named sourdough. And in ancient times, all bread was sour. Humans didn’t have the technology to mass produce light & sweet breads – all bread was heavily fermented, sour, and made good use of the wild micro-organisms in the environment as a fermentation starter. Ancient breads were likely what we would now call "rustic" sourdoughs. And the starters humans used to kick-start each new bread batch were maintained throughout the year. Many think that passover was used as a time for folks to restart that old sourdough starter. Think wiping clean your pantry and starting a fresh batch of fermented dough with all new microbes.

In the past, this was a way to keep your bread fresh & wipe out old & "unclean" micro-organisms. And so folks came to associate ancient sour breads with uncleanliness. Think of the symbolism that we use nowadays for chametz and its "corrupting influence", "souring" our souls with false pride. This was potentially an ancient survival tactic, keeping our bread fresh and stale microbes at bay.

Cut to modern times where anti-microbial soaps and hand sanitizer is commonplace and where our food (and soil in fact) is sanitized, pasteurized & sterilized. This has led to an equally sterilized body. Our intestines are not brimming with life & rich diversity anymore and we are only beginning to understand the negatives of our modern war on bacteria. Maybe it is time to rethink this war, this this doctrine against sourness. And maybe passover is the perfect time to explore the upside of chametz thru a reinterpreted seder plate where we can together investigate the value that "unclean" bacteria play in our lives!

This coming passover, I plan to incorporate fermented foods on my seder plate. I plan to lead a discussion on the ubiquity of fermentation in Jewish cuisine and put it specifically within a Passover context. To symbolize the harsh suffering and bitter times Jews endured as slaves, I will incorporate lacto-fermented bitter & pickled greens on my seder plate. And my karpas will be dipped into sauerkraut brine, which is essentially alchemically-activated salt water. The brine will represent less the Israelite tears and more the conductive material for transformation. Around our seder plate, we will discuss how the pain of slavery can be a transformational experience towards community connection and solidarity in the same way that brine & microbes are a transformational experience for the cucumber on its way to becoming a pickle! So let us rethink chametz together and find ways to incorporate traditional fermented foods on our seder plates. And let us reinterpret our passover traditions and redefine them in ways that make sense today.

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Book Club Archive

Books I've Read Recently

Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, by Weston A. Price: Rather that theorizing abstractly about human nutrition, the author sought out isolated groups of healthy people around the world (this was in the 1930s, when there were still isolated groups of people), and documented their foodways. Price's book is jaw-dropping (literally). He describes group after group of people who are healthy in isolation, and become sick, miserable, and toothless when they adopt a "modern" diet. Aren't you curious what they were eating when they were healthy? Full write-up coming soon.

Japanese Cooking: A Simple Art, by Shizuo Tsuji and Yoshiki Tsuji: A masterwork on the subject of Japanese cuisine, and by extension, Japanese culture.

Winning Bicycle Racing, by Jack Simes: A short, fascinating book on the subject of bicycling, published in 1976, when the majority of men still wore moustaches. And as with any bicycling publication, there are some great facial expressions.

The Secret History of the World: As Laid Down by the Secret Societies, by Mark Booth: A truly fascinating, meticulously documented look at the evolution of human consciousness and religion. What are some of the connections among different religions' creation myths and pantheons? Why are there astrological and other "pagan" symbols in Christian rites? Did you know that "elohim", the Hebrew word in Genesis typically translated as "God", is actually a plural noun? And so on. N.B.: the book describes an almost exclusively male experience. I think Booth could have done more in the front material to explain this, or at least to notify the reader of the orientation.

The Sushi Economy: Globalization and the Making of a Modern Delicacy, by Sasha Issenberg: The history of sushi and the sushi supply chain, detailing the journey that your fish takes from the cold ocean to your neighborhood sushi bar, often by way of Tokyo. Sasha Issenberg focuses on the lives of the people involved in the sushi trade. Fascinating and well-written.

The Story of Sushi: An Unlikely Saga of Raw Fish and Rice, by Trevor Corson: The story of some students at a sushi academy—and more generally, the story of sushi itself. A wonderful book, entertaining, thorougly and carefully researched, and instructive. It makes me want to eat sushi. Or write about it. Similar, but only a bit, to The Making of a Chef, by Michael Ruhlman.

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